It’s no secret that Georgia is growing, and fast. Experts predict that the state’s population will boom over the coming decades, with estimates saying Georgia will add 3 million people by 2060.

​“We only have the land that we have now, and the land is the host of everything,” said Katherine Moore, president of the Georgia Conservancy, during a virtual presentation, Land Use and Impacts on Forestry, at the 2023 Georgia Forestry Conference. “Our built environment, our natural environment, all that we need for industry, for quality of
life, for food and water, for wildlife — we are not going to get any more of that land. That land is itself a limited resource.”
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Moore led an unprecedented investment for the Georgia Conservancy alongside partners at Georgia Tech: a 50-year land cover analysis for the state of Georgia analyzing the impact that the state’s exceptional growth will have
on local land use. While many eyes are pointed at the Atlanta metro area, data collected by the study shows that communities across the state, both urban and rural, will experience transformational landscape changes over the coming years.

“Let your eyes linger at the growth around the other metros — Savannah, Augusta, Columbus, Macon-Bibb, Albany, and even far south to Valdosta,” said Moore. “Within that, look at some of the more rural growth. We often don’t take that as seriously as we notice some of the major metro growth, and all that growth has implications.”

Amid national concerns about sustainability and renewable resources, Moore stressed that land is the most important limited resource of all.

“If we find ourselves in a resource crisis, it’s probably because we’ve gotten there through a land crisis,” said Moore.

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Urban Sprawl Encroaches on Land
There is indeed legitimate cause for concern for a land crisis. Low-intensity development is driving a rapid change in land use across the state — out of sync with and even more rapid than the population growth rate. Take the metro Macon-Bibb area, for example: From 1980 to 2016, two acres were developed per every new resident, for a total of more than 61,700 acres developed.

Some of the state’s largest agricultural counties and outdoor recreation areas border metro Macon-Bibb and are
threatened by urban sprawl. Combined, the economic impact of these two industries in the state tops $100 billion each year. Of that, forestry is responsible for $41.3 billion each year.

“Look at South Georgia and you’ll see what could be called rural sprawl. Growth in other parts of the state, while not as concentrated as you would see in a metro area, still has implications,” said Moore. “We should be aware of that and think about those implications, especially as that type of development may fragment landscapes and may create disconnections in natural systems or forested tracks that we need or would prefer for other uses.”

The sprawl of development has chewed a hole through Georgia’s agricultural land over the past half-century. Since 1970, more than 2.5 million acres of agricultural property have been developed for other uses — an amount greater than the size of Rhode Island and Delaware combined. Of that, roughly 2 million acres were forest, and only 350,000 of those forested acres were in metro Atlanta, meaning most of the loss of forest to development occurred in other areas of the state.

The cover change has also had huge implications for watersheds across the state, particularly in metro Atlanta but noticeably in other regions as well, threatening water quality and quantity for people, industry and agriculture.
Forest loss has been widespread.

In fact, most Georgia counties have experienced forest loss since 2001. Many only mildly, but that forestland isn’t
coming back.

“Once land of any type is converted  to any type of development, we have to consider that pretty much permanent,”said Moore. “How often do we see something bulldozed, infrastructure pulled up and something replanted? We don’t really see that. We certainly don’t see it on a mass scale. So, these decisions about land and these conversions to development, we must contemplate as being almost permanent.”

“We know that the quality of life and the functioning of all industries and the health of Georgia citizens rely on the ecological attributes of both natural and working forests.”— Katherine Moore, President, Georgia Conservancy

Protecting Land as Its Uses Evolve 
The Georgia Conservancy has designated development as the number-one threat to agriculture and forested land acres. One form of development is permeating agricultural and forested land use quicker than others: utility-scale solar. From 2012-2022, more than 30,000 acres of agricultural land were converted to utility-scale solar. Of that, roughly 20,000 acres were fields and croplands, and 5,000 acres were forests. While solar only accounts for a small percentage of the 2.5 million acres converted to development since 1970, its exponential growth is on track to take a large share of development in the future.

“That is not an insignificant number of acres, and we know that it’s a growing and emerging field,” said Moore. “Now is absolutely the time for a multitude of industries to work with the solar industry to think about solar siting, land management decommissioning and what happens to the land once solar utility is removed and no longer viable or desired at a particular location.”

So, the challenge presents itself — how do we address land-use change and the sprawl of development so that it is sustainable and protects our natural resources, particularly forests?

The data she shared confirms that, as a state, “we have not grappled with how we provide for housing, places of employment, modes of transportation, and other types of developed land cover in a way that is sustainable over time,” said Moore. “We know that the quality of life and the functioning of all industries and the health of Georgia citizens rely on the ecological attributes of both natural and working forests.”

The needs of a growing population will continue to grow in turn. The solution, according to Moore, is a combination of thoughtful public policy, effective public and private leadership and education on what’s at stake.

“It’s greater intentionality at a local level, a regional level and a state level with our land use and land management decisions. And I think we have the incentive there because we know that the quality of life in Georgia is important to us now, important for future generations,” said Moore. “We know that there are real jobs, real dollars, real lives that rely on these industries that are under threat by the way we have treated and acted in terms of development in the future.” 

■John Casey is a strategic communications consultant with a primary focus on journalism, politics, and public policy.